Watch: Trey Gowdy Laughs in the Face of Chuck Schumer’s Demands to Acting Attorney General

Trey Gowdy is a pretty serious guy. The South Carolina congressman built a strong reputation as a no-nonsense prosecutor before bringing his skills to Washington, but even he couldn’t keep a straight face after hearing what Democrat Senator Chuck Schumer just declared.

During an appearance on Fox News, Gowdy was shown a clip of Schumer basically demanding that the new attorney general bow down to Robert Mueller, who is currently conducting the special counsel investigation into the unproven Trump-Russia collusion.

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“Our paramount view is that any attorney general, whether (acting AG Matt Whitaker) or another one, should not be able to interfere with the Mueller investigation in any way,” Schumer declared at a recent press conference.

“They should not be able to end it, they should not be able to limit it, they should not be able to interfere with Mueller going forward,” he continued.

As Fox cut away from the clip back to Gowdy’s reaction, the fiery lawmaker stifled a bemused smirk over Schumer’s limp demand.

“Every prosecutor has jurisdictional boundaries,” Gowdy responded, shooting down the Democrat’s claim that Mueller should have unlimited freedom with almost no oversight.

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“I don’t know a single prosecutor that does not (have boundaries). And Mueller’s jurisdictional boundaries were set by (Deputy Attorney General) Rod Rosenstein,” he pointed out.

The South Carolina congressman went on to explain that it’s important for any prosecutor, whether local or national, to have limits and oversight — which is exactly what the attorney general provides.

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“But there’s never been a prosecutor that’s had unfettered power to go investigate whatever the heck he or she wanted to do,” Gowdy stated.

“If you’re a state prosecutor, you can’t investigate federal crimes. If you’re in New York, you can’t investigate things in Idaho. So the notion that we’re going to create a special council that has no boss, no jurisdictional restrictions at all is just typical Chuck Schumer,” he shot back.

Gowdy, who currently sits on the House Judiciary Committee, also added his thoughts about the firing of Jeff Sessions from the attorney general post.

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“It was gonna happen. I knew it was gonna happen after the election … I did not think it would happen before all the votes had been counted,” Gowdy quipped. “He’s been a proverbial dead man walking for several months now.”

Sessions turned in his resignation at the request of President Trump just a day after the November 6th midterm election. As Gowdy pointed out, his departure was long anticipated, especially after the president publicly criticized his job performance.

The reality which almost everyone now acknowledges is that Mueller’s probe has dragged on much longer — and unearthed surprisingly less — than even Trump’s critics expected.

If there is real evidence of misdeeds, then Mueller should lay it out for the American people. But this cannot go on forever, especially with no oversight. It’s time to wrap it up — and Sessions’ departure is likely the push that was needed to make this happen.

Benjamin Arie is an independent journalist and writer. He has personally covered everything ranging from local crime to the U.S. president as a reporter in Michigan, before focusing on national politics. Ben frequently travels to Latin America and has spent years living in Mexico.
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Benjamin Arie has been a political junkie since the hotly contested 2000 election. He attended Florida State University and informally majored in women’s studies, primarily the sorority on the other side of his dorm.
After giving rickshaw driving and nightclub management a go, Ben settled on journalism after realizing he could get paid to rant. He cut his teeth on car accidents and house fires as a small-town reporter in Michigan before becoming a full-time political writer.
Benjamin had a front row seat to the 2016 campaign circus while covering angry protesters and Donald Trump’s nomination at the GOP convention in Cleveland, which cemented his view that half of the country is insane. He has lived as an expat in Latin America, and enjoys piloting gliders and scuba diving when he can get away from the grind.